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I mean, ok. But you are basically arguing that fraud should be allowed, because it is between "consenting adults". If that's what you want, fine. But you shoul

by stale2002 8y ago

I mean, ok. But you are basically arguing that fraud should be allowed, because it is between "consenting adults". If that's what you want, fine. But you should be open and honest about the fact that you believe that financial fraud should be legal. And I'd like to point out that fraud is not a new concept. It is something that has been explored in many aspects of society, and most people oppose fraud. Fraud on a Blockchain is still fraud.

CryptoPunk 8y ago
Fraud by definition is non-consensual, since it means someone not consenting to a material fact that was withheld from them about the interaction. It's fundamentally theft through misrepresentation of facts and should always be illegal. Someone saying "We believe this token will go up 200% in two years" is probably not a misrepresentation of facts, and thus not fraud, and should probably be allowed, and they should suffer the reputational damage when their predictions don't pan out. But if we created laws that did prohibit people from hyping up the investment potential of a token they put for sale, or laws that require token sale organizers to disclose the general risks around investing in speculative assets, like requiring them to include a statement on their website like "this is a highly speculative asset that has not been registered with the SEC. Speculative investments have a high likelihood of losing all of their value. It is recommended that you get professional investment advice before making an investment into a speculative instrument like this, and that you avoid investing a large portion of your wealth in them", that would probably be fine. It wouldn't be a major impediment to voluntary exchange. Like I said though, what the SEC is seeking to do goes far beyond barring token sale organizers from hyping their project's profit potential, or requiring such warning messages on their websites. If that's all the SEC wanted to do, I wouldn't be nearly as opposed, if at all.

CryptoPunk 8y ago

Fraud by definition is non-consensual, since it means someone not consenting to a material fact that was withheld from them about the interaction. It's fundamentally theft through misrepresentation of facts and should always be illegal. Someone saying "We believe this token will go up 200% in two years" is probably not a misrepresentation of facts, and thus not fraud, and should probably be allowed, and they should suffer the reputational damage when their predictions don't pan out. But if we created laws that did prohibit people from hyping up the investment potential of a token they put for sale, or laws that require token sale organizers to disclose the general risks around investing in speculative assets, like requiring them to include a statement on their website like "this is a highly speculative asset that has not been registered with the SEC. Speculative investments have a high likelihood of losing all of their value. It is recommended that you get professional investment advice before making an investment into a speculative instrument like this, and that you avoid investing a large portion of your wealth in them", that would probably be fine. It wouldn't be a major impediment to voluntary exchange. Like I said though, what the SEC is seeking to do goes far beyond barring token sale organizers from hyping their project's profit potential, or requiring such warning messages on their websites. If that's all the SEC wanted to do, I wouldn't be nearly as opposed, if at all.